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Gilligan apologises over Kelly e-mails

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Today defence correspondent Andrew Gilligan apologised on Wednesday for e-mailing information to two Commons Foreign Affairs Committee members that revealed Dr David Kelly as the source for BBC colleague Susan Watts’ Newsnight report.

At the Hutton Inquiry, Gilligan conceded it was “quite wrong” of him to have suggested to Liberal and Tory MPs David Chidgey and Richard Ottaway that Kelly was Watts’ source.

“It was quite wrong to send it. I can only apologise. I didn’t even know David Kelly was Susan Watts’ source,” he told Jeremy Gompertz QC, the Kelly family’s counsel.

However, Gilligan justified his action by saying he was under an “enormous amount of pressure at the time”. He also sent suggested questions the MPs might want to put to Kelly when he appeared before them.

The Radio 4 journalist also admitted to “slips of the tongue” during the twoway broadcasts on Today on 29 May, when he described Kelly as his “intelligence service source”.